The Third Victim Part 55

"He didn't say a word. He just sighed. Heavily. Like .. . like someone hopeless. Then he hung up."

"You're sure it was Danny?" Rainie spoke up for the first time. She was leaning against the windowsill all the way across the room. Her arms were crossed over her chest. Her cheeks were gaunt. Frankly, she looked the worst that Sandy had ever seen her.

Not that Sandy was in a position to talk. She'd quickly grabbed a nearby OSU sweatshirt after receiving Danny's call, and it turned out to be stained in four different places with old yellow baby spit-up and new white patio paint. Her normally bright blond hair was dull and matted from sleep. She hadn't showered, let alone put on makeup. She didn't have the energy anymore to worry about these things.

"It was Danny," she told Rainie firmly.

"Shep changed our number to an unlisted one two days ago. Only family

members and Danny's lawyer know how to reach us now. We haven't gotten one of those calls since." :

"Are you getting a lot of pressure from your neighbors?" Quincy asked gently.

"Some." Sandy kept her chin up.

"Others, our good friends, are still there for us. One couple on our block I don't even know them that well came over last night with a plate of brownies and sat with us. There are .. . bad moments, but there are good ones too. Danny's innocent until proven guilty, you know." ;

Unable to help herself, she turned once more toward Rainie.

"It's official police business," Rainie said curtly.

"I can't talk about it."

"Rainie, he's my son. He's upset, he's suicidal. Just yesterday he tried to gouge his wrist with a fork, for chrissakes. I'm not sure how much longer he can take being ; locked up in the detention center, and I don't know what to do. Shep tells me there's proof someone else was involved -mysterious sh.e.l.ls, I don't know. Can't you do something with that? Drop the charges? Bring Danny home? Please' Sandy's voice broke off pleadingly. She didn't know Rainie well. She would call her a friend, but more because they had Shep in common than because they'd ever spent any time talking. Still, Rainie had come to their house for dinner at least once every few months. She played with Danny and Becky. She seemed to honestly enjoy time with the kids. Surely she wouldn't forget those moments now. Surely she wasn't completely immune to Danny's plight. The woman in question, however, remained impa.s.sive.

Her uniform suddenly loomed as a wall between them, and for the first time, Sandy got it. Rainie wasn't looking at her as the sheriff's wife. This morning Sandy was in the task-force center as a ma.s.s murderer's mother.

Sandy threw out desperately, "Maybe Shep can help find out who did it."

"We don't want Shep," Rainie said flatly.

"We want Becky."

"What do you mean?"

"Is she still sleeping in closets, Sandy?"

"That's not anyone's business ' "She saw something; we all know it. You and Shep keep saying you want the truth. Let us ask for it."

"Avery Johnson would never permit it."

"It's not his call."

"Yes, it is! He's our lawyer. My G.o.d, we're going to have to mortgage our home just to pay his fees. After all that, how can we not listen to what he says? He's acting in our best interests."

"What about Becky's best interests?" Rainie pressed relentlessly.

"The girl only feels safe in enclosed s.p.a.ces. She's having nightmares, and Luke says she's as pale as a sheet. How long are you going to let that go on?"

"The doctor said she'll grow out of it with time ' "We can make it sooner versus later."

"You can't have Becky! Dammit, Rainie, she's all I have left!"

Rainie pressed her lips into a thin line. She gazed at Sandy disapprovingly. Sandy returned the stare. Rainie didn't understand what she was asking. She wasn't a mother.

"We can prove that Danny didn't shoot Miss Avalon," Rainie said abruptly.

"We can tell by the slug that was recovered and the trajectory of the shot that it was done by someone other than Danny."

"Oh thank G.o.d." Sandy sat back in the metal chair. For the first time in three days, she felt weight lift off her chest.

"So there was this man in black at the scene. He's the killer, and Danny's just confused and traumatized by what he saw. Can't you drop the charges now?"

"Mrs. O'grady," Quincy said quietly, "I think there are some things about Danny you need to know. I suspect you're beginning to wonder about them, too, or you wouldn't have called this morning."

Rainie supplied bluntly, "We're not sure he didn't kill Sally and Alice."

"But the man, the man in black ' "Ballistics matched the slugs that

killed those two girls to the .38 revolver Danny brought to school.

And we have his prints on the other .38 sh.e.l.l casings recovered at the scene."

"That just means he loaded the guns," Sandy countered.

"Shep explained this to me. The prints don't prove a thing."

"Danny's fingerprints are on over fifty sh.e.l.l casings. That means he also reloaded the guns during the shooting."

"Shep told me that rapid loaders were used. So Danny prepped the guns and the rapid loaders. This other person did all the shooting."

Rainie finally pushed away from the window. She shook her head impatiently.

"Listen to yourself! Danny brought a revolver and a semiautomatic weapon to school. He loaded them, and he prepared additional ammunition. Does that sound like an innocent bystander to you?"

"He's just thirteen ' "You don't have to be old to pull a trigger."

"He's confused' "He confessed multiple times!"

"He's frightened! He's angry, he doesn't understand' "He told Charlie Kenyon he wanted to hack Shep into twenty pieces and run him through a blender! Jesus, Sandy, we're beyond simple acting out. You didn't catch Danny smoking a cigarette or staying out after curfew. He's involved in a triple homicide. At the very least, he supplied the murder weapons. At the most, he may have ma.s.sacred two eight-year-old girls. For G.o.d's sake, wake up!"

"My son is not a killer!"

"But maybe he is! Now, what the h.e.l.l are we going to do about it?"

Rainie drew up short. She was breathing hard. Sandy was breathing hard too. She glared at her husband's most senior officer, and she thought she had never hated anyone more. How dare she talk about Danny that way. After all those dinners in Sandy's home. All those times Danny had asked to sit next to her, sweet and adoring. The cold, unfeeling And then she realized that Rainie's eyes were overbright. And then she realized that Rainie Conner had thinned her lips in order not to cry.

The air left Sandy's lungs in a whoosh. In Rainie's frustrated gaze she saw all the truths she'd been working diligently to deny, and suddenly she had no defenses left.

Her son was a loner. And subject to fits of rage. And he struggled with Shep and struggled to fit in at school and, dear G.o.d, he was good with guns. Learned everything straight from his father.